Yo Unregistered: Join us for the April 1 meeting when it will be Recovery night. We will have demonstrations working with winching, recovery and spotting. We will meet at 7:30 p.m. at Jefferson County Fairgrounds (not Stevinson Toyota but nearby).

Nothing super special here but figured I would post up my install in case anyone else down the road is looking for ideas...Having a mobile rig in the LX vs. just the HT was SUPER nice Having the FT-8800 and being able to monitor two frequencies was even better.

Thanks to Nathaniel quite awhile back for the idea on the install location - I wanted to retain my PS rear cargo panel "pocket" for storage (winch controller, straps, hitch pin/lock, etc.) and he mentioned that the subwoofer support bracket makes a good base to attach the radio to. In a LX450 you don't have the subwoofer in the rear so this space is open. I found a guy on MUD parting out an 80 and for $10 or so I picked up the subwoofer bracket and hardware.

Pretty straight forward install once I figured out clearance for the radio and drilled the holes in the bracket.. Power is fed from my aux fuse block under my PS seat so the runs are short and the power seems to be "clean" enough that I don't have any problems. I remote mounted the head to a common location on the shifter console right below where the ashtray is (in my case where my CB is). I also determined that a remote speaker was needed which for now I installed under the dash on the DS on top of the dead foot dealyo until I come up with a better plan.

Note to others...If you are programming the radio with a laptop, go ahead and program the radio BEFORE remote mounting the head unit. Not rocket science but hard to read the instructions on the laptop in the rear cargo area from the front of the rig when you need to push this button and that button on the head uint

Nice job. And yeah on the programming, that is something that occurred to me, too. But just the same it's good to figure out a way to do it in place since even with 500 memories you'll probably want to reorganize or add to them once in a while. Pretty much means taking the face and the short cable to the radio temporarily, unless you have a helpful wife/kid/dog. Now Fido, push 'yes' on the laptop. :-)

Hi Corsair23,
I am getting into the ham thing. thanks for the mounting ideas.
I also came to the conclusion of split unit, just not sure which one yet.
I have a 6 x 30amp fuse block in the rear panel fed from my second battery. So the location is you have chosen will be mine as well.

How/where did you feed the front panel wire? along the passenger side?

The cable for the head unit to remote locate it up front is run along the PS, under the trim etc. with everything else. I run most stuff in the plastic "channel" deals, whatever their technical name is.

I got the Yaesu separation kit vs. making my own cable and it was plenty long to reach...I bought the radio from Ham City because they include the separation kit pretty much all of the time. You can see the excess length of cable wrapped up and twist tied to the bottom of the bracket.

As for the cargo mat...That's just the OEM carpet - I keep it looking decent with a husky rear cargo liner.

I just copied your location - I'd like to fab up a braket though that would move the faceplate out further and up to just under the CB...Would make it easier getting to those little buttons and knob dealyos